Simplicity Meets Parenthood in an Urban-Country UK Bungalow

Name: Ben and Viv Yapp, and their two little sons Covey and Arlo
Location: Bristol, UK
Size: 1,450 square feet
Years lived in: Owned 1.5 years

Having been in London for over 10 years, my husband and I finally decided to leave our little flat and moved to the countryside in Bristol. We bought a granny bungalow to renovate, and after watching countless episodes of Grand Designs (and after lots of blood, sweat and tears) we turned this former bungalow into a two-story modern house for our young family.

The build itself was a rather big project, and while there were lots of things we couldn’t really do ourselves (like converting the loft), we tried to make this our own by being creative in the small details. I made all the leather handles for the kitchen cabinets by hand, and we used ordinary subway tiles for the kitchen backsplashes but placed them vertically to create a different look. Instead of painting the walls lots of different colours as we did in our London flat, we kept it white this time, but had some fun painting the skirting boards and the doors in Farrow & Ball Pavillion Grey.

A few trips to the local timber yard and some hastily calculated measurements later, my husband Ben had created the desk and shelving units for my studio. He has made the desk extra long so that me and the kids can all do crafts together on the same table.

Not everything in this renovation has gone to plan, and there were certainly hiccups—I’ll never forget how we had to shower in a garden bucket when we first moved into the building site (all whilst being pregnant at the same time)! But now that the scaffolding is down and all the walls are painted, it’s exactly what we hoped it to be, and we couldn’t have asked for a more perfect place to bring up our little family.

Our Style: Simplicity-meets-parenthood.

Inspiration: We love travelling and I’m inspired by the places we’ve been to and hotels we’ve stayed at whilst on holiday.

Favorite Element: I love the big bi-fold doors that link our kitchen/diner/sitting room and the garden.

Biggest Challenge: Living in the building site for three months whilst I was pregnant.

What Friends Say: The light! Was it really a bungalow?

Biggest Embarrassment: Not quite our embarrassment but our builder cut the hole for the sink the wrong way round, with the tap facing away from us—it was a costly mistake!

Proudest DIY: The DIY leather handles I made for our kitchen cabinet.

Biggest Indulgence: The Italian marble in the bathroom, although we bought them with a half price discount, it turned out to be very expensive as we didn’t realise we needed to hire a specialist tiler to tile it (and they aren’t cheap!)!

Best Advice: Don’t be afraid to have white walls as you can still introduce lots of colours using artwork or a throw/rug/cushions.

Dream Sources: We had spent a lot of hours watching Grand Designs, ‘researching’…

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